


Late Night Frights

by I_eat_nightmares



Series: Pre-series Prodigal Son [3]
Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Gen, Pre-Series, im drinking love jessica juice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-10
Updated: 2020-08-10
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:28:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25824379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_eat_nightmares/pseuds/I_eat_nightmares
Summary: Her own son accused her of being complicit in these deaths, of contributing in some way, and the part of it all that hurt the most was that it might have been true. Had she been so willing to ignore the problems in her home so she wouldn't have to see an affair that she let twenty-three, hell maybe more, human beings lose their lives under her nose?.Malcolm tried to tell Jessica something was off five years before Martin was arrested, she thinks about it years later.
Relationships: Malcolm Bright & Jessica Whitly
Series: Pre-series Prodigal Son [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1715377
Kudos: 12





	Late Night Frights

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this in February and it was actually the first thing I wrote for Prodigal son. I would've sworn I posted it but I didn't so posting it now seems like a great cop out so I don't have to motivate myself to write anything else!

Malcolm wasn't supposed to be awake for another seven hours seeing as it was a school day, but he needed to get a glass of water from the kitchen. His bathroom was a much much  _ much _ more discreet place to get water from, as his mother and father almost never heard him sneakily grab the glass he used to "forget" on his nightstand and fill it in his sink, but the best water in the house came from the kitchen, and his daddy had told him that he should strive for the best. That meant missions at midnight for great water. 

He was just a few precious seconds from his goal, holding the glass in hand, all that was left to do was fill up the glass and return to his room, when suddenly he heard a scream. It wasn't a fun scream, like when he was swinging with his friend on the playground yesterday and he screamed as he let go and flew off the swing set. No, it was more like how his mommy screamed when she saw a mouse. His mommy was in bed, though, so who could've been screaming?

He set the glass on the counter and tip toed as quietly as he could toward the sound of the noise. He couldn't hear the screams anymore, but it seemed to be coming from the basement. He wasn't allowed down there without mommy or daddy, but he was already breaking one rule, so another wasn't that bad right?

No sooner than he put his foot on the first step, did he hear his mother's footsteps approach. 

"Martin?" She pushed her hair out of her face and her eyes widened a hint when she saw her son beginning his descent into the basement. "Malcolm what are you doing? You need to go back to bed!"

"I heard screaming, mommy." Malcolm's eyes widened as he realized he was caught and he looked over his shoulder at his mother. 

Jessica hadn't heard anything. "I know you like daddy’s work, but you can’t make up an excuse to see his study without him,  _ especially  _ in the middle of the night. Just go back to bed, dear." She would check the basement, just to see if she was right about what Martin was doing without her, but she sent her son back to sleep with a glass of water (ignoring his small protests of “ _ no _ ,  _ mommy _ ” and “ _ I heard something I swear _ ”) before she did. 

There was no one there, of course. She had top notch security systems to tell her if someone was in her home, so there was no danger. At the time, the only damage done was a hint of fear for her marriage, as Martin was still nowhere to be seen when she returned to bed, but all of that faded a few months later when Ainsley was born. Martin could not have cheated on her. Not when that could keep him away from his children for any longer than he had to be. 

* * *

Years passed and things changed, however, and almost twenty-five years after that moment she wondered for the first time in a long while if the scream was real.

What victim was it? Was it Emilia Fortworth or Hannah Johnson or the woman Malcolm swore was real? Both aforementioned women's deaths were attributed to the surgeon and they had gone missing around that time, and Jessica prays, despite not being religious, that the other woman truly was imaginary, but she can’t truly believe that until her son does.

Her own son accused her of being complicit in these deaths, of contributing in some way, and the part of it all that hurt the most was that it might have been true. Had she been so willing to ignore the problems in her home so she wouldn't have to see an affair that she let twenty-three, hell maybe more, human beings lose their lives under her nose?

Let the record show that Jessica Whitly was not a crier. She didn't cry even once when her husband was taken away, her eyes were dry at her children's graduations, and she faced the same accusations that her own flesh and blood had just turned against her from reporters and news outlets, with audiences Ainsley would do anything to get, without shedding a single tear. 

But to hear her son say this to her? 

She covered her mouth with one hand and clenched her seat belt in another. She did not want anyone to see her cry, so she tried her damnedest to keep the tears in until Adolpho brought her home. That didn’t work of course, black tears falling onto her hands and in her sorrow she thought for a brief frightening moment, that mayhaps this was a representation of her soul. Was she so evil and uncaring and foolish that now her tears showed the rotten condition of her spirit? All of these thoughts fled from her mind quickly when Adolpho asked her a quick “where to, ma’am” and she realized her mascara was running. 

“Home, please.” She made a pitiful attempt at drying her eyes before reaching into her purse for a makeup wipe and just removing the mess from her face. 

She couldn't let herself mope for long, she always had believed the third best way to solve your own problem was to help others (the second best being alcohol, and the first being a touch less legal) and she needed to get to the homeless shelter where she was meant to volunteer today, but for just a minute, she could sit in her car and wonder why she didn't listen to Malcolm sooner.


End file.
